Writing and related stuff

Friday Follies #52 – 3 mistakes that make me go “Arghhh”!

Welcome to our 52nd edition of Friday Follies! The Grammar Cop is proud to have reached the cusp of a one-year milestone. But she is not proud that the longevity of this feature means that errors still abound! Ah, well. ‘Tis my lot to point out gaffes and make snarky remarks about them, I guess. So here we go once again.

CNN.COM – “Different parts of the plane can be effected in different ways.” Look, I’ve addressed this mistake many times. You can just type “effect” or “affect” in the search box to the right of this article, and see all former explanations. Briefly: the sentence above calls for affected. Note that the verb is always affect. The noun is always effect, as in “to have the desired effect on something.” Yes, there are a couple of exceptions. (What would the grammar world be like without exceptions!) Affect can be a noun when it means one’s emotions, as in “Scott Peterson’s affect seemed flat after his wife went missing.” The other exception is for the noun effect, which can also be a verb in the sense of “to effect change in something.” What a mess, eh?

HUFFINGTONPOST.CO.UK – “…when the animal picked up a large stone with it’s trunk…” No. The dreaded it’s/its mixup rears its head once again: When used in the possessive sense, the spelling should ALWAYS be its. NEVER it’s – that is a contraction for it is. No exceptions whatsoever. Yay!